previous shows at fpac gallery

The Fort Point Arts Community Gallery is pleased to announce Futureland, the third show of the 2017-2018 season, juried by Mary Tinti.

Futureland is a two-person, site-specific installation of new work created for the FPAC Gallery by Mea Duke and Douglas Breault. The installation title, Futureland, derives from the name for the information center for the artificial island of Maasvlakte, a deep-water port in Rotterdam in the Netherlands. Maasvlakte’s landform started developing in the 1960s during Rotterdam’s postwar revitalization, continues to grow, and is engineered to serve as a major stopover for the global shipping industry, capable of berthing the world’s largest ships.

Duke and Breault incorporate how “sea-blindness,” a term more generally understood as “out of sight, out of mind,” relates to how unapparent it is how goods make their way to our stores and homes. The continuously increasing size and efficiency of the shipping industry somehow makes it harder to see. Duke and Breault chew over the sheer volume of everyday goods that crisscross the globe, from bananas to automobiles and oil, and the vast impact the trillion-dollar shipping industry has on the environment, the global economy, international relations, and cultures. The artists’ enlist painting, printmaking, sculpture, and photography to intertwine the familiarity of the objects with their absurd and elusive navigation through unregulated spaces globally.

On February 1, 2018, at 2:00 pm the School of the Museum of Fine Arts Senior Thesis Program, instructed by Andy Graydon and Kendall Reiss, will visit the exhibition for an informal artist talk and exhibition tour with the artists Mea Duke and Douglas Breault. This public is invited to attend and to contribute to the discussion and observe in the space.

In preparation for the students’ upcoming senior thesis exhibition, the topics will range from conceptual and formal elements of the installation to the technical aspects of installing and promoting an exhibition as artists. Duke and Breault will discuss writing press releases and artist statements. They will also lead exercises in viewing their own artwork objectively and critically when installing an exhibition.

About The Artists

Mea Duke is a painter, printmaker, and sculptor whose work implicates our political and economic relationships with the global shipping industry and environmental impact of maritime operations. Duke grounds her interdisciplinary within one broad interest: the negotiation and navigation of unregulated spaces. This broad question motivates her to create a humorous exploration of the lines between “painting an object” and “painting as an object.” Rather than make art that delivers this statement, Duke finds it more satisfying to ask further questions and point out these moments in our everyday lives. Duke is on the faculty at the Massachusetts College of Art and Design and Montserrat College of Art, and is a Postgraduate Teaching Fellow at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts University.

Douglas Breaultexpanded an initial focus on photography to include painting, sculpture, installation, and video. Breault overlaps and mangles media, creating hybrid artworks in which the physicality of the materials are simultaneously strategic and improvisational. Gestural acts of decision making, spatial relationships, and repeated imagery drives the process, largely informed by art history, digital media, and unraveling identity. Phenomenological traces of tape, lines, paint, and deconstructed objects combine to act as a particular visual archive that moves through space and chance. Breault has exhibited extensively at venues throughout the Northeast, including the Bristol Art Museum, the Rochester Museum of Fine Arts, and the Stone Gallery at Boston University.

About the Juror

Mary M. Tinti is an independent curator and art historian specializing in contemporary New England art and public art. Prior to her most recent position as curator of the Fitchburg Art Museum, Tinti was a Koch Curatorial Fellow at deCordova Sculpture Park and Museum, the first-ever Public Art Fellow at the New England Foundation for the Arts, and the Deputy Artistic Director of WaterFire Providence. Tinti received her B.A. from Providence College and her Ph.D. from Rutgers University.

By Way of Color and Design

The Fort Point Arts Community Gallery is pleased to announce By Way of Color and Design, the second show of the 2017-2018 season, juried by Mary Tinti.

By Way of Color and Design celebrates the mesmerizing, open-ended language of color and composition through the paintings of Denise Driscoll, Nancy Hayes and Marc St. Pierre. Bold color, repeated marks, ambiguous space, and delicate line create new, yet plausible, spaces that evoke the familiarity of a half-remembered dream.

With unabashedly bold palettes, each artist draws upon pattern, form and line to develop a personal language of abstraction. Driscoll’s paintings layer color and mark over repeating shapes to create playful diagrams that map the relationship of part to whole across multiple perspectives. St. Pierre’s paintings are influenced by architecture as well as topography in a blend of intricate layers of visual information that is both constructed and unsystematic. Hayes’s paintings utilize geometry, spatial layering, organic forms as well as a highly structured foundation.

While each of these artists spins a deeply-coded, privately-held story as a painting unfolds, the viewer will encounter the paintings of all three as springboards—points of departure—into their own imaginative, reflective reveries.

“The eye-catching abstraction of these three artists will hang together beautifully,” says Tinti, “and there is a great deal of dynamic synchronicity in the work that will be lovely to see reverberate from wall to wall.”

“Similar to an explorer, the encaustic and collage paintings reference the language of maps and aerial views,” says St. Pierre. “I use a variety of printmaking processes as a departure for recording marks, surfaces, and layers. This becomes a collage groundwork that allows me to invent the abstract equivalent of land patterns such as the meeting point of landmasses and water for example. The result moves the viewer gradually over this precarious equilibrium constantly in flux.”

“In my paintings, I invoke the playfulness of game boards and the mystery of ancient icons,” says Driscoll. “Paint is brushed, stamped, repelled, stenciled, masked, washed, sanded, and dotted. Colors are layered and marks gather, mapping the relationship of part to whole across multiple perspectives.

“Painting permits direct access into my own personal laboratory where I develop forms and visual landscapes built from my imagination,” says Hayes. “I work with color, line, pattern, and shape, arranging and rearranging until I am inspired to elaborate on a composition, going deeper into its texture, its biology. My objective is to allow the viewer to explore their own visual narrative, enhancing the forms with their imagination.”

About the Artists

Denise Driscollis a multidisciplinary artist who uses painting, installation and collaborative practice to explore interconnection, inner experience and invisible social structures. Driscoll is a SOLO2017 winner at Bromfield Gallery and her paintings and collaborative projects have been shown throughout New England.

Nancy Hayes was raised in a family that held principals of design before comfort or practicality. My father an architect, and mother a floral designer, she was destined to see the world through its structural patterns and organic essence.

Marc St. Pierre is a Massachusetts artist who has participated in numerous solo and group shows throughout in this region. His artwork establishes a dialog between the unsystematic and the constructed. “The result moves the eye gradually over this precarious equilibrium constantly in flux”.

About the Juror

Mary M. Tinti is an independent curator and art historian specializing in contemporary New England art and public art. Prior to her most recent position as curator of the Fitchburg Art Museum, Tinti was a Koch Curatorial Fellow at deCordova Sculpture Park and Museum, the first-ever Public Art Fellow at the New England Foundation for the Arts, and the Deputy Artistic Director of WaterFire Providence. Tinti received her B.A. from Providence College and her Ph.D. from Rutgers University.

Fall Open Studios Members’ Show

Our Fall Open Studios Members Show features individual works by FPAC members in a range of mediums. Join us for the reception on October 12, from 5:30-7:30pm, which kicks off Open Studios weekend! Many artists featured in the show will also be participating in Fall Open Studios. This show is a great way to preview work by artists whose studios will be open. Studio locations will be listed with the work so you can plan your Open Studios weekend accordingly!

Convergence of Souls: Three Interpretations, Three Styles

The Fort Point Arts Community Gallery is pleased to announce Convergence of Souls, the first show of the 2017-2018 season, juried by Mary Tinti.

William Turner, Tracy Hayes and Gretchen Woodman became friends while taking art classes at New Hampshire Institute of Art in Manchester, NH. During many conversations, the three realized their common interests in culture, humanity, and ecology. While Woodman pairs human objects with animals in a suggestively painful manner, Turner portrays nature decomposing the man-made machine, crumbling industry into rust and moss. Hayes’s images are suggestive of the process underlying Turner’s decomposition, a behind-the-scenes view of nature winning over human chaos. Collectively, this assembly of work suggests a vision of hope for a symbiotic relationship with all life.

WilliamTurner’s former 30-year career in automotive restoration has left him with a deep appreciation of the unique character and style of vintage vehicles. They truly represent American culture, he says, as well as periods in the nation’s industrial growth and world influence. His allegorical narrative oil paintings (inspired by art history, ancient myths, and folklore) have been reinvented using vehicles. He is currently working on a series with toys from the 1950s and 1960s. Turner holds a BFA and MFA in painting. His classical realist paintings expressively capture memories of past times. turnwoodfineart.com

Gretchen Woodman creates drawings, paintings, and mixed media works to explore human/animal relationships in two ways. She researches issues within the field of human animal studies to generate concepts to explore visually. In addition, she seeks the essence of the animal through visual means to create emotional connections to animals. www.gretchenwoodman.net

Tracy Hayes explores connections in emergent patterns of lines, textures, and values through ink, acrylic, and pen. She is concerned with the role of individual voice in an increasingly complicated, varied, and noisy environment. External forces buffet and twist Tracy’s emotions, driving her to chart an organic path of inner currents and forces on paper and canvas. tracyhayesartist.com

Says Tinti, the artists “represent three very different aesthetics that, when combined, provide a fitting prelude to the eclectic concepts, interpretations, and styles that will converge at the FPAC Gallery throughout the upcoming exhibition season.”

Show of Hands: Gestural Works on Paper

The Fort Point Arts Community Gallery is pleased to announce Show of Hands, the fourth show of the 2016-2017 season, juried by Jeffrey De Blois of the Institute of Contemporary Art/Boston.

Show of Hands features Adria Arch, Kristin Breiseth, Catherine Carter, and Anthony Falcetta, four Massachusetts artists whose distinctive mark-making reveals the movement of their hands as they work. In palettes ranging from somber to vibrant, each employs a wide variety of nontraditional techniques including pouring, scraping, dragging, extruding, trimming, and tearing. The resulting works on paper retain the essence of these original gestures, leaving a permanent record of the creative spark.

Adria Arch splashes diluted paint, then embellishes the impromptu outlines with precisely crafted edges and backgrounds. Her quirky forms wriggle and twist across the page, performing their own little dances with offbeat grace.

Kristin Breiseth pulls paint over the surface in flowing motions that leave a rippling trail. Quiet tones imbue her monotypes with dimension and majesty, just like the watery environments they evoke.

Anthony Falcetta spreads paint in angled, interlocking shapes that are bold in color and complex in texture. Broken areas allow a glimpse through the jewel-toned strokes to decipher the history of layers.

“By retaining the energy of their initial applications, these artists manage to capture fleeting moments in the studio,” says Catherine Carter, who curated the show. “Without recognizable imagery or formulaic results, the spontaneity of their approach becomes the main character in their artwork. Thus they are reflecting and commenting upon the ephemeral and unpredictable nature of human experience.”

About the Juror

Jeffrey De Blois is a curatorial assistant at the Institute for Contemporary Art/Boston. Formerly, as a curatorial fellow at MIT List Visual Arts Center, De Blois co-organized the center’s exhibition Katrín Sigurdardóttir: Drawing Apart, with Paul C. Ha. At the ICA/Boston, he organized The Freedom of Information, part of a larger upcoming exhibition First Light: A Decade of Collecting at the ICA. He holds a Master’s in the history of art and architecture from Boston University.

spring art walk group show

Fort Point Arts Community celebrates Spring Art Walk with its semi-annual members exhibition. Featuring over 40 works by FPAC artists in multiple disciplines, the Spring Art Walk Group Show is just a taste of what our members have to offer.

Big Red & Shiny, Boston’s only independent contemporary art magazine, presents thirteen artists to mark its 13th year of publication. Since its founding in 2004, BR&S has published over 2,500 pieces of writing cultivating a conversation around thousands of artists who live and work in Boston. The publication provides not only coverage, but access, community, and a platform for critique to artists and cultural producers working in Boston and New England.

In 2017, the publication will continue to cultivate this conversation through our commitment to covering a variety of exhibitions that speak to the diversity of art making in our city and region. In Teenaged, BR&S presents thirteen artists who have contributed to this conversation in some way, be it their own writing, or profiles, interviews, or reviews of their visual work. This sampling of art making in Boston demonstrates the vitality of contemporary art practices in the city.

Hearth and Fire

The Fort Point Arts Community Gallery is pleased to announce Hearth and Fire, the fourth show of the 2016-2017 season, juried by Jeffrey De Blois of the Institute of Contemporary Art/Boston.

Hearth and Fire features Joe Caruso, Marjorie Kaye, Rachael Shatil, Tani Shavit, four artists who utilize materials to produce sculpture that is informed by prehistory.

“Our materials and concepts emerge from an Earth-centered gestalt, steeped in archaeology,” they write.
“The concept of hearth—sanctuary, light, food, kinship, love, hope and protection—refers to basic markers and needs in the human experience. The concept of fire—the release of energy—refers to the forging of our materials to fashion objects that reflect traits of existence such as the need and will to survive, the ability of conceptualize, the belief in a higher power.

“Contemplation on the nature of human evolution is addressed in the form of the hand-built, however we step through a wormhole into the present in our making of our work. Materials such as pigments have changed throughout the centuries. Power tools and welding instruments have enabled the conversation to occur at a faster and more inclusive rate. Science and humanities co-mingle in inform each other. The commonality that runs through our work is a connection with the past, a harnessing of what has been lost, and a reaffirmation of the uniqueness of the human experience.”

Marjorie Kaye’s work addresses the puzzles present within the etheric universe, the mechanics of duality, vibration and magnetism. Using individual shapes cut from plywood, then nailed, glued, and painted, they often form circular and cone like entities, reminiscent of cairns and other ancient and organic forms. Her gouache paintings are built from inner observation and arise from the disorder of things.

Joe Caruso rescues discarded objects and allows them to reemerge and reassert themselves in the form of totems and power figures. With references to Congo, Aboriginal, pagan and ancient cultures, they reflect man’s enduring belief in the sacred, in greater and all powerful spiritual forces. Caruso’s paintings are very archaeological in nature; using sand, paint, wax and natural materials, they have many layers, which have been excavated, re-constructed, and excavated again.

Rachael Shatil’s work reflects post-war trauma, family loss. and remembrance. She addresses these ideas through her choice of found objects and traditional materials and the ways in which they are assembled, modified, restructured, stuffed, glued, sewn, and/or braided together is, in itself, a repetitive, ritualistic practice. Some of her pieces, largely figurative, may be described as mementos of a lost past.

Tani Shavit’s work is forged in fire and retains a fluid, humanistic expression. She is immersed in a manual process from clay to bronze that hasn’t changed in thousands of years. Her pieces travel back and forth between hand wrought primitive forms and elegant bronze surfaces. Her work is deeply rooted in the human figure.

About the Juror
Jeffrey De Blois is a curatorial assistant at the Institute for Contemporary Art/Boston. Formerly, as a curatorial fellow at MIT List Visual Arts Center, De Blois co-organized the center’s exhibition Katrín Sigurdardóttir: Drawing Apart, with Paul C. Ha. At the ICA/Boston, he organized The Freedom of Information, part of a larger upcoming exhibition First Light: A Decade of Collecting at the ICA. He holds a Master’s in the history of art and architecture from Boston University.

unearthing

Using different media to communicate in vivid color, Page Pearson Railsback and Barbara Leiner inspire a complimentary, exciting environment. Their different styles and sensitivities create an interactive relationship that opens the door to viewer involvement.

Both artists received juried residencies at the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, Massachusetts. They met there two years ago and were inspired by each other’s commitment to painting and love of color. Leiner paints large, luscious abstract shapes, using oil sticks. Railsback uses acrylic in a representational style as well as abstract, building up her painting with layers of small shapes that eventually soften to geographic-like landscapes.

Page Pearson Railsback: “My painting is a metaphor for my life emerging from my spiritual heartwork. Each day a fresh start to create through vibrant color and shape. A few charcoal lines on house painted canvas starts my process whether I am painting from nature or from my inner thoughts. I build up layers using acrylic paint, pastels, oil sticks and charcoal . . . then go back in again and push/pull until the painting is revealed. Intuition leads the way and my soul eventually connects with yours.

Barbara Leiner: “A weathered onion, an old glass bottle, a face that tells a story is the muse that starts my journey. I am inspired by life’s landscapes, a gesture, a line. Color and texture drive my path while layering creates an area of rest. My paintings are feminine, strong and vulnerable. I work towards my own truth, my authentic voice. I let my painting inform me, creating a conversation that goes back and forth. Probing, pushing, disrupting and destabilizing as a sense of urgency and commitment command me forward. I want my painting to resonate, connect and create a relationship communicating visually what words cannot.”

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like father unlike son

Like Father Unlike Son: Two Contrasting Modes of Expression Erik Bornemann and Richard Bornemann

Exhibition: September 1 – October 7, 2016

Reception: Thursday, September 15, 5:30–7:30 pm

Artist Talk: Saturday, September 17, 4:00 pm

The Fort Point Arts Community Gallery is pleased to announce Like Father Unlike Son – Two Contrasting Modes of Expression, the first show of the 2016-2017 season, juried by Jeffrey De Blois of the Institute of Contemporary Art/Boston.

Like Father Unlike Son features the work of two artists who, though being father and son, have chosen widely different media and expressions for their work. This show examines the sometimes hidden connections and influences that occur between two artists within a familial context. Two artists grow up in the same house. One father, one son. The son grew up watching the father create work. Traveled with him to shows, openings, witnessing new ideas in development. Even providing input. The son goes to art school and majors in oil painting. Within several years, he finds his voice. And his work is totally different from the parent’s—or so it would seem. Different medium, technique, expression, subjects. The father’s work is representational. The son’s is abstract. On the surface, they have nothing in common. Or, is this really the case?

Erik Bornemann’s work is distinctive in its use of bold compositional elements that combine color in unexpected relationships. As an artist who is inspired by the natural environment, his compositions are informed by landscape, and his work maintains a subtle, yet unmistakable connection to the natural world. His work is primarily created in oil, with accents of acrylic, oil pastel, and other mixed media. He is a recent graduate of MassArt.

Richard Bornemann creates imaginary architectural landscapes, which he then translates into print form using CGI software and image editing tools. His work is characterized by its otherworldly simplicity, architectural elegance, and bold color. His work has been shown throughout the U.S. and Canada.

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300 summer

August 1 –August 25, 2016

Opening Reception: Thursday, August 4 starting at 5:30pm Music by John Cremona and Larry Plitt: 5:30-6:30pm, followed by a reception with the artists

300 SUMMER isan exhibition of paintings, photographs, works on paper and new media by residents of The Artist Building at 300 Summer Street, one of Boston’s first live-work artist cooperatives. The artists at 300 Summer Street provide an important cultural resource for the Fort Point neighborhood and beyond. For over 20 years, the resident artists have created their work in a wide range of media. Among its members are recipients of prestigious awards, including Guggenheim and Fulbright Fellowships. They have exhibited locally, regionally, nationally, and internationally.

The Artist Building at 300 Summer Street is a vibrant live-work artist community comprised of 48 live-work spaces and a dozen art-related businesses. The FPAC Gallery, housing the organization’s main office, was part of the coop development to serve as an asset to Fort Point artists and the neighborhood. Structured as a limited equity cooperative, the building is owned and managed by its residents. The goal was to create permanent affordable artist live-work space. Price increases are capped to ensure that the units will be affordable for artists in perpetuity. The productivity and activity of the artists at 300 Summer Street and at the two other Fort Point artist buildings, 249 A Street Cooperative and Midway Studios, are major assets to Boston’s cultural life.

The 9-story, 100,000-square-foot building is located in the historic Fort Point neighborhood. Designed by the key architect of the neighborhood, Morton D. Safford, in the Classical Revival style for wool merchant, Jeremiah Williams & Co., the 1898 building was renovated in 1995. The renovating architect was Lajos Heder. The entrance area features an art-in-architecture artwork, a recycled steel canopy by Mags Harries.

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Spring 2016 Open Studios Group Show

Open Studios Kickoff! Opening Reception: Thursday, June 16, 6-8 pm exhibition on view June 16-July 22, 2016 Twice a year, FPAC artists open their studio doors to share the arts, industry and culture of this unique community, with the public. FPAC’s Spring Open Studios event features the work of over 100 artists, crafts people, and designers. This exhibition features work from over 50 Fort Point artists. Use the work in this exhibition to locate where your favorite artist is showing in the neighborhood. DOWNLOAD THE OS MAP/INFO BROCHURE

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To Everything and Nothing: Ingrid Sanchez and Alexander Squier

May 12-June 9, 2016Reception: Thursday, May 12, 5:30-7:30 pm Artist Talk and Live-Printing Event: Saturday, May 14, 2016, 2:00-4:00 pm Both artists will perform a live-printing demonstration, printing on each other’s prints to create totally unique and improvised compositions. To Everything and Nothing is an experimental “meeting” of two distinct and personal visual vocabularies. The origins of these marks and forms are destroyed through the cumulative process of silkscreen monoprinting. As more information is layered, in both two and three dimensions, new forms emerge and the result is a new visual language. For artists Ingrid Sanchez and Alexander Squier, this process leads to discovery; the outcome is never certain. Through collaboration, Sanchez and Squier hope to compound this generative endeavor, and explore on a grand scale the latent potential of conversation between independent processes. The notion of layering and communication breakdown relates to contemporary ideas of media overload. The artists will mimic this overload through screen­printing, which itself harkens back to the not­so­distant history of mass media. Leading up to the exhibition, Sanchez and Squier will continue to produce and accumulate monoprints to assemble side by side as part of the same sculpture. The installation itself will be an organic, collaborative assembly that takes shape in the moment. Following the opening, both artists will perform a live-printing demonstration, actually printing on each other’s prints to create totally unique and improvised compositions. The prints will finally exist three­dimensionally in the gallery, tiled, layered, folded, suspended, and even cut. The artists emphasize surface as a passage into the work, to reveal through metaphorical qualities of ornamentation and texture the new nature of the subjects within. The prints will fill the space, and even function as a sort of architecture themselves, the residue of a conversation.

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A Fragile Balance

Artists: Jesse Burke, Caleb Charland, Christine Collins, Eric Gottesman, Lisa Kereszi, Justin Kimball, S. Billie Mandle, and Rania MatarMay 1–May 8, 2016Opening Celebration: Friday, May 6, 6:00–9:00PM The reception will start with a 6PM conversation with curator Karen Haas and artists Christine Collins and Jesse Burke, followed by the opening night exhibition party till 9PM. A Fragile Balance presents eight New England photographers who reflect the ever-more uncertain world in which we find ourselves today in myriad different ways. Their wide-ranging work speaks to the critical tipping point we have reached in our increasingly tenuous relationship to the natural world and to others. Like a canoe gently bobbing on the smooth expanse of a lake at night, our very human desire is for equilibrium and a sense of direction, but our day-to-day experience often belies that deep-seated longing for stability. Caleb Charland, Christine Collins, Lisa Kereszi, and Jesse Burke’s photographs explore man’s indelible marks on the landscape, our precarious connection to the physical environment, the scars of suburban development, and the larger cycles of life, death and regeneration. While Justin Kimball, Eric Gottesman, S. Billie Mandle, and Rania Matar are more often drawn to document the fleeting and ephemeral aspects of humanity, the plight of the displaced and disenfranchised, the passing traces one leaves behind, and abstract concepts such as faith, loss and forgiveness. ––Karen Haas, Lane Curator of Photographs, Museum of Fine Arts About the Curator Karen Haas has been the Lane Curator of Photographs at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston since 2001, where she is responsible for a large collection of photographs by American modernists, Charles Sheeler, Edward Weston, Ansel Adams, and Imogen Cunningham. The Lane Collection, which has recently been given to the Museum, numbers more than 6,000 prints and ranges across the entire history of western photography from William Henry Fox Talbot to the Starn twins. Before coming to the MFA, she received her MA from Boston University and held various curatorial positions in museums and private collections, including the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, the BU Art Gallery, and the Addison Gallery of American Art in Andover. Her recent activities include exhibitions, Gordon Parks: Back to Fort Scott; Edward Weston: Leaves of Grass; and Bruce Davidson: East 100th Street; and publications, An Enduring Vision: Photographs from the Lane Collection; MFA Highlights: Photography; Ansel Adams; and The Photography of Charles Sheeler: American Modernist. About Flash Forward Festival 8 days of FREE International and New England photography in Boston: Set within the Boston cityscape, Flash Forward Festival celebrates New England and international photography. Programming includes talks, nightly events, indoor exhibitions throughout Boston, and outdoor exhibitions—six curated container exhibitions and the Photoville Fence. The exhibition is on view at FPAC Gallery from May 1-May 8.

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ARCK and FPAC: Unlock the Children’s Creativity

Join ARCK and Fort Point Artists Community for a reception and open house for the exhibition Unlock the Children’s Creativity! Unlock the Children’s Creativity is an exhibition of work produced by students of Art Resource Collaborative for Kids (ARCK), a nonprofit whose mission is to empower Boston Public School students with a high-quality arts education that fosters culture and community while supporting each school’s learning objective.Unlock the Children’s Creativity is an exhibition and collaboration between ARCK and the Fort Point Arts Community Gallery to promote and advocate for arts education in the Boston Public School community, and exemplify how community members can come together to build bridges and eliminate silos. This ambitious exhibition catalogs a pivotal moment for more than 100 students, ages 5 to 13, from three schools: East Boston Early Education Center; Blackstone Innovation School (South End); and Gardner Pilot Academy (Allston). Organized under the three primary themes of ARCK’s curriculum – Leadership, Civic Engagement, and Social Justice – this exhibition gives a voice to children through art and expresses the multicultural identities of Boston students. About ARCKARCK is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that grew from a 2011-12 pilot “Diversity Thru Art” program at Boston’s Josiah Quincy Elementary School (JQES). ARCK has brought art education to some 1,000 students in six underserved Boston Public Schools. In addition to ARCK’s signature program of hands-on visual art integrated with intercultural exchanges and visual and written literacy, ARCK is developing a comprehensive STEAM curriculum, with lessons aligned with Common Core and visual art standards and incorporating STEM components. There is a strong and consistent focus on making connections with students’ lives, communities, and diverse cultures. One of ARCK’s overarching goals is to engage families and communities in local children’s education and growth. This art exhibition and collaboration with FPAC is an opportunity for young students to share their creations and reflections not only with school peers and staff, but with family members, friends, and adults in the wider community. The exhibition is on view at FPAC Gallery from April 4 – 27, 2016.

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High Low

HIGH LOW: Alexandra Borovski, Alexander Clayton Johnson, Nicholas Mello, & Eric StefanskiFebruary 23 – March 29, 2016 Reception: Thursday, March 3, 2016, 5:30-7:30 pm High Low is a group exhibition of four Boston-based artists, Alexandra Borovski, Alexander Clayton Johnson, Nicholas Mello, and Eric Stefanski, whose work involves the recycling of art historical tropes and genres with abjectness, irony, and humor. This exhibition was juried by acclaimed documentary filmmaker and Emerson College Professor John Gianvito. Alexandra Borovski is an interdisciplinary artist. She is a first-generation immigrant from the Soviet Union and makes work that involves a process of mining lost, fractured, and re-imagined folklore. Alexander Clayton Johnson makes paintings that are mash-ups of seemingly disparate images, taken from screen shots of pornography and sixteenth-century Venetian master paintings. Nicholas Mello sees within the paradox of the lottery a shared relationship to the issues regarding contemporary painting. Instant success within the art world is as much of a pitfall as a jackpot in the lottery. This duality continues to drive his work. Eric Stefanski’s work is a reflection of identity viewed through the lens of the South-Side of Chicago. He aims to capture a duality between the absurd and the abject. References to alcoholism, violence, incarceration, and mourning run parallel with irony and humor in his work.

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Building Stages: Robert Maloney & Chelsea Revelle

January 12 – February 18, 2016 Opening Reception: January 21, 2016 from 5:30 – 7:30 pm Artist Talk: February 5, 2016 from 5:30 – 6:30 pm Assembling a wide range of materials in various stages of construction, Maloney and Revelle explore concepts of memory as it is recalled over the passage of time. Their works reveal peeling layers, overlapping imagery and discarded remains that are meant to provoke the viewer. What appears to be abandoned urban architecture and domestic dwellings sets the stage for past or future narratives. The work on display is a mixture of prints on paper, modular structures, shadow boxes, installation and digital projection that together balance and challenges our perception and the role we play both inside and outside of community. Maloney’s exteriors evoke the gridlike structure of the city as well as the layers of memory, as they are in the process of atrophy while Revelle’s interiors reflect the complexity of feminine ideals confusing our sense of real and depicted space, seemingly setting a stage for the viewer to play. This exhibition was juried by acclaimed documentary filmmaker and Emerson College Professor John Gianvito.

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Mosaic Muse

Mosaic Muse: Six Contemporary Mosaic ArtistsOctober 30 – November 27, 2015 Opening Reception: Thursday, November 5, 2015, 5-7 p.m. RSVP David Fichter, Cynthia Fisher, Yetti Frenkel, Lisa Houck, Bette Ann Libby, and Joshua C. Winer Mosaic Muse features the work of six artists using diverse techniques and materials to create contemporary mosaics. Pieces include both decorative and functional work, from wall-mounted designs to freestanding sculpture. As new adhesives, mortars, and substrates have been developed, this ancient art form has evolved, giving artists a wide range of options for mosaic applications. This collection of the six artists’ work will both introduce the public to the possibilities of the mosaic process and inspire fellow mosaicists and novices. Educational Events: Artists’ Talk: Thursday, November 19, 7-8 pm Introduction to Mosaic Making Workshop: Saturday, October 31, 10 am-noon Mosaic Materials and Techniques Technical Workshop: Saturday, November 14, 10 am-noon

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in passing

In Passing Curated by Gary Duehr Exhibition artists: Gary Duehr Jeffrey Heyne Jennifer Liston Munson David Palmquist Larry C. Volk September 10 – October 8 Reception/Artists Talk, 9/17 5:30 – 7:30 PM RSVP hereIn Passing presents the work of 5 artists whose work is a hybrid of photography combined with painting or printmaking: Gary Duehr, Jeffrey Heyne, Jennifer Munson, David Palmquist and Larry C. Volk. Although photography’s origin is that of freezing motion (and time) as a way of preserving memory, each of these artists explores how photography, when altered or extended, can allow motion to partially wipe away the memory of a place or event. They all owe a debt to Einstein’s notion that time only occurs when change happens; if nothing changes, time does not pass. These 5 artists try to catch the moment of transition between stillness and action, between motion and memory. Photo: David Palmquist, Little White Houses

Seeking Structures of Comfort

Lydia Harris/Gianna Stewart

Reception: July 9, 5-7pm RSVPArtist Talk: July 23, 6pm RSVPOn view July 9-August 31, 2015 The Fort Point Arts Community Gallery is pleased to announce a two-person exhibition juried by Andrew Witkin, Gallery Director of Barbara Krakow Gallery, Seeking Structures of Comfort, featuring the work of Lydia A. Harris and Gianna Stewart. At times the world around us is confusing, chaotic, even volatile. We seek justice, peace, inspiration, and, at times, we simply seek comfort. In SeekingStructures of Comfort, artists Lydia A. Harris and Gianna Stewart investigate sources of comfort–how we use materials, situations, objects, people, and ideals to rejuvenate, to heal, and to insulate. Seeking Structure of Comfort navigates sources of comfort: homes, people, objects, materials, and processes. The artists find comfort in process–Harris’s postcard project culminating in a book and sculpture and Stewart’s meditative circles of circles. The artists invite the public to join them on Thursday, July 23rd at 6pm for an exchange of ideas on comfort in potentially uncomfortable situations, and to help finish a participatory sculpture, The Comfort Structure. Lydia A. Harris is an award-winning photographer. She is currently working on a major documentary series, portions of which are in this exhibition, portraying the original homeowners of a historically black neighborhood in Atlanta, GA. Harris received an MFA at the School at the Museum of Fine Arts/Tufts University, Boston, a Museum Studies Certificate from Tufts University, and a Professional Certificate in Photography from Maine Media College in 2010. Originally trained as a microbiologist, she holds a Bachelor’s of Science degree from the University of Maine and a Master’s of General Administration degree from the University of Maryland. Gianna Stewart works in wood, metal, video, and site-specific installation. She received her MFA from the School at the Museum of Fine Arts/Tufts University, Boston, and a BFA from Seton Hill University, Greensburg, PA. Stewart’s Toll With Me on A Street in Fort Point was a public art commission for Fort Point Open Studios this Spring.

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For more information about the artists’ work, please visit their websites. Gianna Stewart’s work can be found at www.gianna.works. For Lydia Harris’ work on Collier Heights, please visit collierheights.lydiaharrisphotography.com or contact LAH Studio, publisher@lydiaharrisphotography.com.

Previous Shows:

Drawing and Sparring Group Show

Reception: June 11, 5:30-7:30pm RSVPOn view June 4-July 2, 2015 The Fort Point Arts Community Gallery is pleased to announce “Drawing & Sparring” –an exhibit featuring work by Fort Point artists inspired by the art of boxing, June 4-July 3, 2015. The Club by George Foreman III opened in January 2014 in the Midway Studios Artist Building. George Foreman III made it clear in his early plans for the Club that it would be a place open to all. Looking for a way to get the neighborhood artists interested, Joanne Kaliontzis (FPAC artist and gym member), proposed the idea of live drawing by artists as boxers sparred in the ring. Artists showed up with pencils, charcoals, watercolors, digital tablets and cameras… This exhibit reflects some of the results of what was done during these drawing and sparring sessions at the Club. Some drawings were complete within seconds, and others have since been revised or used as studies for subsequent work. Some artists respond to the dance-like motions the boxers make or the energy behind the punch. Others find beauty to the gestures, poses, equipment they wear –as well as the gym itself. Drawing & Sparring is a multi-media exhibit that includes drawing, painting, photography, and video. Some sketch work created on-site will be on display as well as more refined work completed in the artists’ studio. This exhibit is a work in progress -with hopes that it will inspire more artists to take part in more Drawing and Sparring sessions at the Club in the future.

Flash Forward Boston’s “The Gun Show”

Reception: May 1st, 6-9pm RSVPApril 24-May 3, 2015 The Fort Point Arts Community Gallery and Flash Forward Boston are pleased to present “The Gun Show,” a group exhibition featuring works by New England artists Roswell Angier, Karl Baden, Claire Beckett, Bill Burke, Alejandra Carles-Tolra, Jim Dow, Jennifer Garza-Cuen, Cig Harvey, Brian Kaplan, Forest Kelley, Camilo Ramirez, Dayna Rochell, and Brian Ulrich. Maja Orsic, Director of Robert Klein Gallery, curated the show. “The Gun Show” brings together photographs of significant visual merit marked by the artists’ inclusion of guns, whether deliberately or incidentally. The intention of this group exhibition is not to say ‘guns are good’ or ‘guns are bad,’ but rather to point out the presence of firearms in our visual and verbal vocabularies and consider their influence on the collective unconscious. The 12 New England photographers in “The Gun Show” are not directly engaged in the study of guns, gun culture, or violence. In the context of this show, removed from the artists’ intended series and stories, we look at pictures of guns as pictures about guns. Flash Forward Boston is a FREE ten-day photography festival featuring works by international artists throughout the city of Boston. For more information about “The Gun Show” and Flash Forward Boston, please visit http://www.flashforwardfestival.com/exhibition/the-gun-show/

Glean

Reception: Thursday, March 5, 5-7pm RSVPArtist Talk: Thursday, April 2, 6-7:30pmRSVPOn view March 5- April 16, 2016Gallery hours: Wednesday-Friday’s 10-6pm (always check our Facebook andTwitterpages for updates on hours). PRESS RELEASE The Fort Point Arts Community Gallery is pleased to announce “Glean,” an exhibition of the work of Sharon Freed, Walter Kopec and Andrew Neumann, March 5-April 16, 2015. Andrew Witkin, Gallery Director of Barbara Krakow Gallery, juried the show. Using a variety of means, materials and methods, Freed, Kopec and Neumann explore and create work commenting on the social and political, highlighting issues of use and abandonment, and navigating personal histories. Sharon Freed, a self-taught photographer, produces both color and black and white images. Through her work, she explores how we view broken, discarded objects. She gives special emphasis to the recurring sequence of use and disposal, of the regarded and disregarded and of the cherished and abandoned. What does it mean when we carelessly dismiss so much–and what are the consequences of such profound disconnection? Freed has widely exhibited in New England. Walter Kopec’s work can be separated into two bodies: “visuals” and “verbals.” His visuals reference the iconic or the symbolic and offer observations and critiques on subjects such as commerce, need/greed, and patriotism. Using common, everyday materials, found objects, and easily identifiable forms, each piece seeks immediate, “comfortable” recognition before often darker underpinnings become obvious. The verbals rely on language and its inherent shape-shifting to offer wry perspective and commentary on ego, desire, and the human need to communicate with certitude. Kopec has been reviewed in the Boston Globe and Art New England. His work has shown recently with the Cambridge Art Association, Danforth Museum of Art, and the University of Maine Museum of Art. Andrew Neumann works in a variety of media, including sculpture, film and video installation, and electronic/interactive music. Originally, his artistic output consisted of single-channel videos and films, then moved on to integrate a variety of electronic and digital technologies into 3D and sculptural work. Additionally, he builds electronic musical interfaces and is very active in electro-acoustic improvisation. Neumann received a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2004. His music is available on Sublingual Records. He has shown his work internationally, including on PBS.

chora

The Fort Point Arts Community Gallery is pleased to announce the next exhibition in the 2014/15 season, Chora, featuring the work of Ariel Freiberg and Filiz Emma Soyak. The show was juried by Andrew Witkin, Gallery Director of Barbara Krakow Gallery.

Freiberg and Soyak re-imagine and visualize what is found between the seen and the peripheral. Dingy corners and scraps of images are excavated for their potential. By layering multiple languages and processes, these non-structured visual moments- otherwise forgotten- are presented to the viewer.

Freiberg is deeply curious about the impact of isolating passages of faces, derived from images from history or mass media, and pairing with a sensory plain. Employed by “urban trickery” or trompe l’oeil, the passages of the faces look like ripped paper. Ironically, this is the grounding element in the painting. The substrate space of the canvas may be a stark contrast to the delicately painted face. The open space of the paintings are stained and aggressively treated, as to reference earthiness and decay. The ambiguity between the edges of ripped faces and the bedrock ground are reminders of the uncertainties of our physical world.Soyak describes her paintings as stories that explore the landscape between the seen, the remembered, and the imagined. Her latest work is informed by the markings and relics she encounters in evolving urban environments, from New York to Istanbul. Soyak strives to honor the history and memory of these artifacts by reconstructing them together with her own interpretations and multi-sensory impressions. For a complete review of Filiz Emma Soyak and Ariel Freiberg’s work, please refer to their websites: www.filizsoyak.com / www.arielfreiberg.comGallery hours: Wednesday-Friday 10-6. Also on view by appointment. Email emily@fortpointarts.org to schedule.

boston art academy’s ‘passion with balance’

On view December 15,2014 -January 2nd, 2015

The Fort Point Arts Community Gallery is pleased to announce a collaboration with the Boston Arts Academy (BAA). A group of seniors at BAA will curate a show that illustrates their curriculum from freshman year through graduation. It will feature students in all grades, and will range from 2-D work to installation projects.

This collaboration represents FPAC’s mission of connecting our artist community and our resources to younger artists in Greater Boston.

Gallery hours: Wednesday-Friday 10-6, as well as Saturdays 12-4pm. Also on view by appointment. Email emily@fortpointarts.org to schedule.

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Previous Shows:

Narrative/Non-Narrative: Two Artistic Approaches

Artist’s Talk: November 14th, 6:30pm, moderated by Kaveh Mojtabai RSVP: Event Brite Artists Mario Kon and Beverly Sky will host an artist talk in conjunction with their current exhibition Narrative| Non-Narrative. Artscope Magazine founder/publisher Kaveh Mojtobai will moderate the discussion around their work, which explores narrative approaches to art-making. Show on view through December 4th, 2014The Fort Point Arts Community Gallery is pleased to announce the second exhibition for the 2014/15 season, Narrative/Non-Narrative: Two Artistic Approaches, featuring the work of Mario Kon and Beverly Sky. The show was juried by Andrew Witkin, Gallery Director of Barbara Krakow Gallery. Narrative/Non Narrative features the work of long time Boston Artists, Beverly Sky (Boston Center for the Arts, Artist Studio Building) and Mario Kon (Fort Point Arts Community), who approach art-making from two distinctly different perspectives and concerns. Ultimately, giving form to a particular truth is what both artists work towards. Beverly Sky’s work adheres to the precept that a picture is worth a thousand words. Ms. Sky utilizes Fabric Collage as a medium to express ideas and stories that engage her aesthetic and intellectual curiosity. Quoting the artist Chuck Close… “Art is a way of accessing a symbolic vocabulary from the deep parts of ourselves that go beyond words and to touch others in that same place.” Mario Kon’s work follows a non-narrative approach, rejecting the assumption that art should be didactic and rational and instead rely on a direct visual experience of the work. Mr. Kon approaches his work with an organic and spontaneous energy. Whether sculpting, carving or painting on wood, he creates visual tensions that transform the surfaces geometrically. To quote the painter Mark Rothko…”Silence is so accurate.” For a complete review of Mario Kon and Beverly Sky’s work, please refer to their websites: www.mariokon.com / www.beverlysky.com

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Previous Shows:

Reconfiguring Abstraction

August 7-September 18th, 2014Gallery hours: Wednesday-Friday 10-6pm, Saturdays 12-4pm300 Summer Street M1Boston, MA 02210Boston Globe, “The Week Ahead” 8/13/2014Reconfiguring Abstraction features the work of two Boston artists, Lisa Russell and Mary Bucci McCoy. Painters Russell and Bucci McCoy present intimately scaled work that, in different ways, abstracts lived experience into sensual painted languages. These languages are engaged with the essential dialectical issues of relationship, space, and material. Each artist shares a succinct and tactile affinity for paint as substance, acknowledging both its physical and emotive presence. Their studio practice falls within the established traditions of abstract expressionism while being forward thinking in its formal presentation. Lisa Russell uses close observation of carefully constructed still life arrangements as the starting point for her paintings. Prolonged visual analysis yields information about form, space, and perception, which become the building blocks of her carefully structured paintings. Through searching for underlying structures and internal harmonies, this process is ultimately a sensorial, perceptual quest to articulate essence. Mary Bucci McCoy’s spare paintings on plywood panels begin with an intuitive engagement with color and with paint as material. Her paintings are indirectly informed by experience and observation of the landscape, nature, and the human body. Bucci McCoy is a 2012 Massachusetts Cultural Council Painting Fellow and is represented by Kingston Gallery, Boston and Gray Contemporary, Houston, TX. This exhibition is curated by James Montford, director of Bannister Gallery at Rhode Island College, Providence, RI, and FPAC member.

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Rob Reeps: A Fine Line:

May 16 – July 26, 2014 The FPAC Gallery will be showing a selection of paintings by the late Rob Reeps, from May 16th through July 26th. The reception will be held May 16th from 5:00 to 8:00. FACEBOOK EVENT All of the paintings are acrylic on canvas, and were created between 1973 and 2011. Rob was one of the original members of the Artist Building at 300 Summer Street. He lived and worked there from 1995 until his death in 2013 after a long struggle with mental illness. The paintings have a common theme of space, time, and place. Rob loved the natural beauty of the lakes and oceans that were the subject of most of his work; showing their organic beauty in contrast to man’s destruction of them by pollution and neglect. His use of particle collision tracks, clouds, measuring devices, dialog boxes (with references to sight, sound, thought, etc) show the relationship of humans to our planet and the universe. In his later work, Rob used what he called “energy signatures” to create backgrounds for his chosen imagery.

The FPAC Gallery is located at 300 Summer Street, on the lower levelcurrent hours: Wednesdays 10-6pm, Thursdays 10-6pm and by appointment. For more information please email gallery@fortpointart.org 617-423-4299 __________________________________________________________________________________________________

Spring Open Studios Group Show

APRIL 24-MAY 12, 2014

Our Spring Open Studios Group Show features individual small works by FPAC members in a range of mediums.

FPAC is a tax-exempt 501(c)3 founded in 1980. Our mission is to enrich the Fort Point area with a resident live/work artist population that contributes to the district's and the City of Boston's cultural life. In addition to fees from our artist members, we depend on support from individuals, corporations, and foundations who appreciate the value of a vibrant arts community in Fort Point. Please consider becoming a supporting member or sponsor. Help keep art alive in Fort Point! Site by: Stoltze Design Site development: Circadia